Advice for draw poker online?

[roll tide]

Roll Tide USED to be chatty in a negative way ha! She has calmed down alot with experience. Thanks for all the compliments guys [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] Now that this site has been brought to my attention, I can keep up with all the gossip about me.

[schubes]

Hey roll! (betn3bet here) Who tipped you off to this site? I'm not quite sure if I want you here.

[roll tide]

I found this in Google someone told me to do a search on Redskelt and I cam into this as well as the article you told me about did non know it was the same site. Anyways it is jsut too bad lol I will now be able to see all the gossip about me and snap you even more lol. I wish we could get more people on the bigger tables though, as well as draw tournaments. Who would want Jacks or better would have to learn a whole new game with the programming we thrive on the fish.

[CrAzY CaRo]

Um...Can You Say "B U S T E D"?Lmao [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] <---- doesnt that make you sick? [img]/images/graemlins/cool.gif[/img]

[bigpooch]

Draw poker means fun and nostalgia, at least to me. So I have a few questions about draw poker online for those who have played it:

1. Where can you find the best high draw action? (Paradise?)


Although there has been low limit draw at Planet, the two
sites that provide the most games online are clearly:

1) Paradise Poker
The game is five handed fixed limit with two blinds to the
left of the button (as in LHE) with no requirements to open.

2) 24h
The game is six handed PL with blinds to the left of the
button and with no requirements to open. Here, the game is
played in Euros and not US dollars.



2. Do the games usually feature a joker? a jacks-or-better-to-open-rule?


There is no bug in the games and no opening requirements.



3. How good/bad do people play? Are the games profitable if you are a decent but not great high draw player?


There is a wide range of players from truly hopeless to some
very good players. The games can be profitable for a decent
player if he is selective of the games he sits in. It is
obvious that most of the profit comes from very weak players
making common mistakes and any players that have significant
leaks. If you can multitable, it is possible to make very
good money in limit but I would warn you not to play too
many PL draw tables because of the "slider effect": the use
of the slider at PL restricts the maximum number of tables
you can play since you need to price your bets. I really
recommend limit because you can really win every single
week you play as long as you put in the hours and play as
many tables as you can (profitably!).


4. Any book recommendations for high draw? I'm considering buying Malmuth's "Winning concepts for Draw and Lowball"


That's an excellent book, but unfortunately it won't help
you significantly in the typical online games. I would say
the same for Nesmith Ankeny's book on PL Jacks-or-better.

For limit, the best book is Zadeh's Winning Poker Systems
even though there may be some small errors in it, and the
opening requirements do need refining (as alluded to by
Mason Malmuth's review). Zadeh's book is also very good for
limit lowball draw.

There is also a series of articles written by Weisenberg in
Card Player magazine and are worth looking through although
to be honest, I also think the opening requirements need
refining and his reraising requirements are a bit loose and
need to be dependant on the opposition. I think they are
somewhat useful to new players from a practical side, but
you won't get the kind of theory you need to get from a book
like Zadeh's.

Also, for the relatively new game of TD (Triple Draw)
lowball, there is a section in Super System 2 by Daniel
Negreanu. Unfortunately, I cannot make an assessment of
that chapter as of yet.

[popniklas]

Thanks a lot for the advice. I have read Wiesenberg's columns and play 1/2 regularly at Paradise now. Also, I have ordered Wiesenbergs "Free Money" and Zadeh's "Winning Poker System" from Gambler's Book Club, they should arrive any day now.

My biggest leak at the moment is the play after the draw. I probably call too much instead of folding, but I am of course working in it. Also, I don't really know when to raise/reraise after the draw except in obvious cases. So I'm not very good at this game, to be honest. Fortunately, there are many players out there who are a lot worse. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

Could you comment a little on where and why you disagree with Wiesenberg's columns (for example, how would you modify his opening requirements)? It would be appreciated.

[bigpooch]

For discussion, assume the game is 5-handed and utg=the
player "under the gun" or next to act after the big blind.

1) On calling after the draw:

Although you mention that you are calling too much instead
of folding (I am the other way around until I have enough
player notes), it isn't terrible unless you routinely always
call, in which case you will be labelled a calling station
and not many players will attempt to bluff you. Against
players that bluff more than what seems to be correct (you
would have to know from playing with them or the hand
histories), you wouldn't be far off from almost always
calling them. For many opponents, especially those that
rarely bluff, you wouldn't be far off from folding except
with those hands that have some slight chance of winning.
If you are not sure at all, you can always resort to game
theoretical calling which is based on the pot size (and
strangely, not at all how many cards you or your opponent
draw) when you are the opener (you initiated the first
raise; it's quite a bit different if you are the big blind).
It's also important to recognize how players perceive you:
if they think you are a caller, they will seldom bluff; if
you've folded frequently against a particular player, you
may have to call (because it's a theoretical one) even if
your notes/experience indicate otherwise. For example, I
know of a player who doesn't play on Paradise anymore (he's
now on 24h), but in two consecutive hands, he attempted to
bluff me (because he was stuck, I thought this would be a
good time to make the first call which is based on theory)
and both attempts, especially the second, surprised me!

So in heads up situations, you're not that far off if you
frequently call until you have sufficient notes on a player
or can get a line on his play/thinking.

Here's a typical example: You open with a pair utg with
either KK or AA (I'll not debate whether you can open weaker
or not!) and your sole opponent in the cutoff makes a cold
call and the pot becomes heads up. You draw three and your
opponent takes one card and from your player notes data, he
is often on a flush draw or an open-ender. You've decided
postdraw, for some reason (I won't get into that), that you
will bet out when you improve and check all other hands.
You don't catch anything and check and your opponent bets.
If you've seen this opponent bluff even once in this kind of
situation, you must call with your unimproved AA all of the
time and KKQ and KKA as well. The pot has $5.25 and your
optimal calling frequency is 5.25/7.25 = 21/29. Your top
fraction of hands obvious includes AA for the top 1/2 and
you can see that KKA and KKQ would be included too.

In multiway pots, you are sometimes at the mercy of being
squeezed out if there is at least one other player behind
you that can defend the pot. Also, you have to read the
situations where there is almost no chance your opponent is
bluffing, unless he misread his hand. On the other extreme,
if the player behind you for some reason drew 4 cards, you
can almost ignore this factor.

2) On raising after the draw:

In theory, players often raise with hands that are really
insufficient, but these raises often work because their
opponent was playing suboptimally. If you are going to
raise, you must be more than a 50% favorite of winning after
your opponent calls or reraise; by how much more than 50%
depends on the size of the pot and how often he will reraise
you (with often a better hand). In the rare case that your
opponent will never reraise you, you only have to be a tiny
bit above, unless the rake factor is involved (yes, the
rake is significant!). The theoretical minimum raising hand
can be approximated by the pot size and range of hands.

Here's a situation that is often misplayed:

The opener raises utg and a very tough player calls in the
small blind with the big blind folding. Both players draw
three cards and you know as well as I do that the tough
player can only have started with one hand: AA. After the
draw, the tough player leads out. Clearly you can't raise
with two pair against this player and arguably you may not
even raise with KKK if he thinks you're a bluffer but not
bluff-raiser! But with two pair, you have to call in case
he was value betting something like AAK or accidentally
misclicked in the play of the hand. Besides, if you never
called in this spot with two pair, you would be giving up
in this situation about 87% of the time (and even if you
called with Aces up, that would only add a sliver).

A far more common situation is when you are heads up with
one of the blinds and both of you draw three and from your
notes you know what pairs this player plays in this exact
situation (he may defend more liberally versus a button
raise and muck QQ versus an utg raise). You both draw three
and your opponent leads out and you have two pair or trips.
Unless your opponent plays a lot of shorts (small pairs)
and always calls your raise, you would be overplaying KK22
if you raised with this. Aces-up represents a borderline
raising hand if your opponent always called your raise but
will be an incorrect play against a player that would fold
a lot of weaker hands when raised or only could have AA. An
easy raise can be made on trips if there is a slight chance
that your opponent could have smaller trips; if that's not
possible, then all of your opponents trips would beat yours
and raising would again be borderline at best because of the
possibility of a reraise: yes, he could have filled or show
you AAA.

On Weisenberg's column about predraw.

Although his opening hand requirements are tight and
aggressive, you won't be using a better exploitive strategy
that exists. In addition, his reraising requirements seem
too formulaic and don't consider how other players will
play. As a very clear cut example: You have QQAK2 utg
and you know the big blind plays shorts. If you don't raise
with this hand in this spot, you are leaving money on the
table. On the other extreme: suppose you see a very good
player limp utg and one other player limps behind. Would
you now raise with KK? Well, to be honest, the last three
times I limped in utg, I held either a pat straight flush or
quads so you would be just losing a bet here unless the
miraculous happened!

Still, I can see players getting something from his articles
and I welcome the columns for promoting the game. On the
other hand, the key idea in Zadeh's book is to base your
play on your opponent's range of hands, bearing in mind that
sometimes your tricky opponents will sometimes deceive you
into thinking that you play seemingly poor hands more often
than you do.

[Tom Bayes]

[ QUOTE ]

On Weisenberg's column about predraw.

Although his opening hand requirements are tight and
aggressive, you won't be using a better exploitive strategy
that exists. In addition, his reraising requirements seem
too formulaic and don't consider how other players will
play.

[/ QUOTE ]

BigPooch is right in that players who play their hands strictly by the Weisenberg article will not be taking advantage of many profitable situations and also leaves yourself vulnerable to the knowledgable players who pick up that you are playing "Weisenberg 101". However, I still highly recommend anyone who is going to play online poker reads this article, both to help your game and to know how some of your opponents play. For those of us coming from a mainly holdem background, we often overvalue certain hands and play them too aggressively. When I first played draw, I overvalued two small pair, not fully realizing how vulnerable I was to players improving a big pair and beating me. Two small pair is probably the "AQ" or "pocket jacks" of draw-a hand that looks nice at first but often can hurt you if you don't know how to get away from it when it's beat. Many other players overplay middle and small pairs, which are crap in most draw situations.

I'm sure Weisenberg realizes that his standards must be tweaked to take advantage of opponents that are either too looser or too tight (and you will see both). To give an extreme example of playing the player, about a year ago I was playing a $5 pot-limit draw tourney at Planet Poker. The player to my immediate left was incredibly tight-never raised w/o at least trips and wouldn't re-raise without a pat hand. I was in mid-position and was dealt a pat straight. A loose player acting UTG makes a pot-sized bet. This guy would make loose calls, so I make a pot-sized raise. Ms. Tight, acting after me, comes over the top with a pot-sized reraise (which would put both Mr. Loose and me all-in). Mr. Loose calls. I know that Ms. Tight has a pat hand and my 10-high straight is probably dead. I throw it away (I would call in a limit game). Mr. Loose draws 2 and fails to improve his trip aces and is knocked out. Ms. Tight shows ace-high flush. Of course, I would not throw away a pat hand against most players, but I felt it was the correct play against this very tight and predictable player.

[Tom Bayes]

I haven't played at Paradise for several months since I prefer tournaments and pot-limit (as found at 24h) as opposed to the 5-seated limit games available at Paradise. However, if you start playing there, a sign that you are a bad player is if bigpooch joins your table ASAP after you sit [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

[popniklas]

How about the 24h games, are the players better or worse than at Paradise, in general? Is PL draw much harder to play than limit? (I'm not a very good NL and PL player. I do ok in NLHE sng:s but pretty much suck at NLHE cash games, other than that I don't play big bet poker. LHE is my main game.)

PL draw seems like a lot of fun if you're good at it, but I don't really know how to play it... are there any resources on PL draw?